1995A&A...300...78E

We present stellar population models for starbursts in a sample of eleven Wolf-Rayet galaxies. Taking into account the observational data available, we try to reconstruct the number of Wolf-Rayet stars observed and estimate the number of type II supernovae that have exploded in the ionizing cluster. Using the stellar yields of the most recent stellar evolutionary models for massive stars, we derive the expected chemical enrichment in helium, oxygen and nitrogen produced by the burst on the surrounding ionized gas. The results of this modelling indicate that since the helium and nitrogen production accounts for a fraction of the total content of the H II regions in these elements - implying the occurrence of previous star formation events in the history of the parent galaxies -, the oxygen appears strongly overproduced in most of the objects. This fact and the correlation between the supernova rates derived for the bursts and their corresponding oxygen overproduction as well as the large volume filling factors expected for the hot gas that fills the supernova remnants, suggest the action of differential mass loss from the H II regions that could lead to galactic winds. We find that the chemical evolution of WR galaxies in the Y vs. N/H diagram appears to run parallel to the fit of the observational data for "normal" H II galaxies obtained by Pagel et al. (1992). Moreover, the pollution by the present-day population of Wolf-Rayet stars is unable to explain the apparently abnormal position of some Wolf-Rayet galaxies on that diagram. We find that the effect of temperature fluctuations in the determination of the electron temperature of the ionized gas probably due to the presence of shocks could be an alternative explanation for this problem.